The Real Truth About Privacy

Back in the late seventies and early eighties I spent my summers sharing beach houses with friends in Avalon, New Jersey. They were lazy, crazy days filled with parties from happy hour to bar closings, excessive drinking, missed meals, and late night hook-ups hastened to the tune of Donna Summer singing "Last Dance."  

There was no Internet then, no cell phones, no text messaging or email. If you wanted to take a picture you needed a camera, not a smartphone. Making movies was reserved for filmmakers. If you were doing something you shouldn't be doing or with someone you shouldn't be with - it was alot easier to not get caught. 

Or so we wanted to believe. 

The truth is people got found out all the time. 

Your constitutional right to privacy meant nothing if that stolen kiss on the beach with the hot guy who was not your boyfriend was witnessed by your guy's best friend. And that joint you swore you didn't inhale? It was shared with someone who would be sure to give you away for the right price.

Which back then, prompted these words of advice from a slightly older and wiser friend.

"If you don't want to get caught - don't do it."

Mmm. So if I thought I might be embarrassed, mortified, ashamed, horrified, humiliated, appalled or any combination there of for something that has my name attached, I shouldn't worry about my privacy. Maybe - just maybe I should just think twice before doing it. 


Of course, today you don't have to be doing much to have your privacy breached. In the world of big data, what I order each time I visit  Starbucks is recorded for all posterity on my rewards App. I can't pretend I went to the gym three times this week because Equinox is tracking the proof. If I pin those cute jeans on Pinterest, thanks to remarketing (also known as stalking) those pants will haunt me until I buy them. Or disable the cookies. Facebook likes to say you get to pick your privacy settings, but really - who are they kidding? Someone at Facebook can surely see through whatever you blocked.

Unless you choose to live in the backwoods without an Internet connection or cell service or Duane Reade on the corner - real privacy in 2013 just does not exist.

I'm not sure it ever really has. But what I do know for sure is that when yours is comprised it spreads faster and quicker than any of us ever imagined back in those glory day summers, whiling away the afternoon in a sand chair admiring the hobie cats lined up on the beach. 

Which leads me back to that wise advice. If you're worried about who is listening in, what people will think if they find out your stuff or that you will get caught doing something you shouldn't be, like ordering one of those cinnamon chip scones made with real sugar, make a choice. 

Own it or just don't do it.

The Advertising Of Experts

Advertising is about creating an illusion. The illusion that if you try this new product not only will you have beautiful shiny hair, sparkling clean floors, or whiter teeth but your whole world will shift. Your husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend, colleagues will be more in love, envious, charmed with you than ever before.

In that illusion is the notion that the creators of the product know some secret thing you don't have access to.  They are experts. That is their claim. Their competition disagrees. They try to convince you they are the real experts by pointing out the other's flaws instead of their attributes. They confuse things.

So who really is the expert? And what exactly does being an expert mean?

By definition it is a person who has a comprehensive and authoritative knowledge or skill in a particular area.

My question is who determines that? Today there seems to be a proliferation of individuals who call themselves experts. But are they really? Or is it just another advertising illusion?

I sit here writing this in front of a 21.5 inch Mac with access to information once reserved for offices. I can interface with a variety of social media  that allows me to"advertise" and "promote" globally whatever I want without paying for a copywriter, a graphic designer or advertising time. I can deem myself an expert on whatever I choose. And if I create the right illusion it doesn't matter if I can back it up with fact.

We all seem to be seeking the experts for that secret piece of information that is life altering, that they know and we don't. We don't question the title of expert. We just want the information, that secret elixir.

In these last days before the midterm election we see the airwaves clogged with individuals who claim to be "experts" in government. Some have the credentials, the education and the experience to back it up. Some are creating the illusion as though it was some great magic trick trying to convince you that if elected they will be able to solve all the problems of Washington that no one else before them has ever been able to.

They all promise that our world will be better with them in it, leading the way. I like to believe that some are right. I'm also wise enough to know that some might fool us and until we see them standing with an empty hat and no rabbit we won't know until then the illusion they created.

Having spent  many years in advertising I am more skeptical than most. So I try to do my homework. To read past the ads, and the slanted editorial posing as news reporting before I make my decisions. Whether it is a new toothpaste or a new governor. I search for authenticity. But then I'm no expert.

What do you think makes an expert?
Are you an expert?